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Ravenheart Review of Netherworld

ARAPACIS..'NETHERWORLD'

(Ravenheart Music) Reviewed 7th December 2011

Arapacis was formed by guitarist Jerry Fielden in Montreal, Canada, in 2003 with the goal of fusing together 70's hard rock and prog with modern gothic, prog and doom metal to form a unique metal fusion, hence they cite their influences as Deep Purple to Rush to Leaves Eyes to Dream Theater to Candlemass, quite a portfolio. This is their third album, following on from 'So Many Leapers' in 2006 and 2009's 'Consequences of Dreams'. Out front is red hot flame haired Lizzie Fyre who can not only really belt it but also has a lovely French vibrato, rather like Belinda Carlisle but with extra oomph. First spin shows that compared to their previous efforts they don't bounce between their extremes as much, but generally opt for a more conventional hard rocking style. The production is also much improved, the murk has cleared and it sounds far more refined. Highlights are the awesome catchy driving rockers 'End of the Line', 'Horror Show' and 'Unbirth' that remind me of The Dictators. 'Lords of Clouds' and 'The Affliction', as befits their titles, have a more doom and Black Sabbath vibe, while 'Beautifully Blind' is a lovely Jethro Tull esque acoustic ballad with some super violin. The most singular and striking number is 'Crisis' which is far more prog metal and marks the welcome appearance of synths courtesy of Guy LeBlanc (Camel, Nathan Mahl), adding some much needed variety to the sound, it has some surprising changes of tempo, and as to what the syncopated key signature is, the mind boggles. On 'Beneath Me' they have an ill-advised bash at death/black metal, quite why Lizzie wants to risk her voice and hence her career by growling and screaming goodness only knows, this is the one song that should have been binned, it does not fit in at all. I'm baffled why the unrepresentative 'Crisis' is the lead single, it's a great song but people will think they're a prog metal band with keyboards, a radio edit of 'Unbirth' would be the more obvious choice. I say radio edit because this and the ballad have unnecessarily extended heavy endings, I'm a strong believer in the KISS method, no, not Gene Simmons and his painted pals, but keep it simple stupid, especially when the songs themselves are so good and stand on their own merits, less can be more. On the other hand the final instrumental 'Dark Days Ahead' sounds like a terrific intro to an unfinished epic, this really does need developing. Throughout the album Jerry provides lashing of expert shredding, and in Lizzie they have a unique, stunning and outstanding singer. Netherworld sees marked improvement in every department, and they have in the main curtailed their excesses to create a far more consistent and polished album with some excellent songs. Initiallly available digitally with the physical release expected early in 2012, this is more for fans of traditional heavy metal and classic heavy rock, their Netherworld lies here, a much improved 8.5/10 (Phil)

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ARAPACIS-Netherworld (Ravenheart Music)
Welcome to the third album by Montreal, Canada based band ARAPACIS. They take you on a journey through various styles in nine brand new tracks and forty-five minutes of rock music. “End Of The Line” already shows, that the band very easily mixes different styles with each other. The main ingredient is rock or metal, but some serious side steps are made here as well. The hard core like screams in this opener for example are not really expected by yours truly at all, but they are there alright. The guitar solo sounds great and the riffs are heavy. Lizzie’s vocals remind me of Gigi Hangach (formerly PHANTOM BLUE singer) at times, only less screaming. A similar vocal sound appears in “Horror Show”, that has some very heavy riffs accompanying it. The guitar solo is once again the eye-catcher here and I just love the sound of the cow bell. It gives it a certain retro twist, that I very much like. “Lord Of The Clouds” is a lengthy and epical tale. It starts with some heavy doomy guitars. This is officially the first doom track by ARAPACIS, I guess and a damn good one, too. Some of the grunt vocals are maybe a bit too much, but I think that this song can easily be added among the highlights on this new silver disc for me. “Crisis” feels good, because of the progressive feeling in this song and the keyboards, that fit very well on a song like this. “Unbirth” sounds very catchy and the instrumental part lifts it up to a higher level. In “The Affliction”, Lizzie shows us, that she can scream out loud as well. It mixes well with the heavy groove of the song. Just listen to the heavy riffs in this track. The solo, that Jerry provides here, is simply high class! Then the time has arrived to slow things down a bit for the ballad, which is called “Beautifully Blind”. It sounds very attractive and shows that these people can be sensitive at times, too - in case you doubted this. Jerry however needed to put some powerful guitar explosions into this track and I must say, that I liked this a lot. How huge is the gap, that you have to jump over to soak up a song like “Beneath Me”? This is death metal with grunts and haunting rhythms. Nobody can make an unexpected switch like that, I guess. It’s truly amazing though how they handle a song like that. The fast and fieriness, that they play this song is really amazing and you can hardly imagine that this is the same band, that almost made you cry of deep emotional feelings in the previous song on this album. The last track is called “Dark Days Ahead” and is a very sober and short instrumental outro and completely different from what we’ve heard until now. The variety of songs is endless on this album and I am sure, that everybody will easily find something for his or her taste here. The songs are great and performed by high class musicians, so high five and both thumbs up again for ARAPACIS. I wonder, who is going to open his eyes and make this band come over to Europe for some shows. I think, they will please a lot of people. Until that happens, I will give this album another spin or two and take another trip to ARAPCIS’ “Netherworld”. ARAPACIS is Lizzie Fyre on vocals, Jerry Fielden on guitar, keyboards, bass and mandolin and Matthieu Roy on drums. Website: http://www.arapacis.com. [9 points] (Toine van Poorten)

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